Thursday, February 17, 2005
as some of you may or may not know, i'm the member of a club called "sex education activists". what we do is basically attempt to get into high schools and teach the kids there about the sorry sad state of sex education in the US today.
some of you might not know very much about the sorry sad state of sex education in the US today. so let me let you in on a little secret: sex education in the US today is in a sorry sad state.
BUT! you say, i'm from the us, i was educated in public schools and my sex education was superb! well i say fine for you. but just so you know, the disease is a degenerative one (those of you who voted for bush can pat yourselves on the back for this one!).
in bush's proposed budget, abstinence-only sex education programs are set to receive $206 million dollars a year. let me repeat that $206. million. dollars. a. year. a. year. yes, a year.
in FY2005, the federal government will definitely spend about $170 million dollars on these "abstinence-only" programs. i'm reading something real interesting, referred to as "the waxman report" right now, so let me let you in on some of the information in this report (which was prepared for rep. henry waxman by "the united states house of representatives commitee on government reform-minority staff special investigations division"...sounds official, eh?)
be prepared to be pissed.
abstinence-only "education" (and i use that term loosely and with regret) promotes "abstinence from sexual activity without teaching basic facts about contraception".
now, i'm all about teenagers abstaining. i did. and i totally survived those years. but i also knew about condoms and alternative sexualities and abortion and pregnancy and venereal diseases and trusted myself to make the right decisions. and i did. *gasp* but the point is that teenagers don't abstain. most teenagers in the US will have sex by the time they graduate from high school. and an even greater number will have sex sometime in their lives. so they need this information. they need to know about sex.
"Other developed countries focus much more on contraception. The upshot is that while teenagers in the U.S. have about as much sexual activity as teenagers in Canada or Europe, Americans girls are four times as likely as German girls to become pregnant, almost five times as likely as French girls to have a baby, and more than seven times as likely as Dutch girls to have an abortion. Young Americans are five times as likely to have H.I.V. as young Germans, and teenagers' gonorrhea rate is 70 times higher in the U.S. than in the Netherlands or France." from http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/16/opinion/16kristof.html?ex=1109307600&en=29f54ad0bc265467&ei=5070
everyone should go, read that now, and then come back and read this next:
here are some other problems:
"Over 80% of the abstinence-only curricula, used by over two-thirds of [federal government] grantees in 2003 contain false, misleading, or distorted information about reproductive health." (waxman report, p. i)
here are some examples. this is being funded by *your* government, ladies and gentlemen, and is going to be getting even *more* money:
one curriculum says that "in heterosexual sex, condoms fail to prevent HIV approximately 31% of the time". oh really? that's news to me. yeah because it's a lie.
so the result?
(from the NY times link above)
"...there's some evidence that abstinence-only programs lead to increases in unprotected sex.
Perhaps the most careful study of the issue involved 12,000 young people. It found that those taking virginity pledges had sex 18 months later, on average, than those who had not taken the pledge. But even 88 percent of the pledgers had sex before marriage.
More troubling, the pledgers were much less likely to use contraception when they did have sex - only 40 percent of the males used condoms, compared with 59 percent of those who did not take the pledge. "
NICE!
i really love the idea of 60 % of teenagers having sex NOT using condoms!!! but why should they, if they all have giant holes in them?
here's some more false information:
"one curriculum states that 5% to 10% of women who have legal abortions will become sterile" this is simply NOT TRUE!!! there is NO increased risk of sterility following abortion. please, someone show me a scientific study that has this as its result. or, even more, produce for me one single woman who got an abortion and became sterile as a result. what? you can't? oh that's because it's NOT TRUE!!!
"another curriculum calls a 43-day old fetus a 'thinking person'."
i'm not touching this one. but you can have your own ideas about it. it's definitely not the sort of "fact" children should be learning through our federal tax money though.
"Abstinence-only curricula treat stereotypes about girls and boys as scientific fact: {one} instructs: 'Women gauge their happiness and judge their success on their relationships. Men's happiness and success hinge on their accomplishments.'"
this, once again, is FUNDED and FUNDED OUT THE ASS by your government. in other words, I paid for this sort of bullshit to reach children's eyes. so did you. way to go!
"Abstinence-only curricula contain scientific errors: [one] states that 'twenty-four chromosomes from the mother and twenty-four chromosomes from the father join to create this new individual'; the correct number is 23."
yes, if you have forty-eight chromosomes, you are going to be one messed up individual. or dead. i don't know the exact repercussions. but i don't think they're good.
now, abstinence-only "education"...does it work? i mean, yeah, if kids don't have sex until they're adults or 'old enough' (whatever that is...), then, hmmm, that'd be great. and it would justify (maybe) the administration pouring millions and millions more dollars into these programs....so do they work? do they? huh? huh?
"in the most comprehensive analysis of teen pregnancy prevention programs, researchers found that 'the few rigorous studies of abstinence-only curricula that have been completed to date do now show any overall effect on sexual behavior or contraceptive use'."
in other words....NO! they don't work....
"in contrast, comprehensive sex education that both encourages abstinence and teaches about effective contraceptive use has been shown in many studies to delay sex, reduce the frequency of sex, and increase the use of condoms and other contraceptives."
wait a minute......this works? huh? but we're not financing that sort of education...i don't get it......*scratching head* oh that's right!!! we're not supposed to talk about sex with children!!!! ohhhhhhh!!!!! i get it. because if we dont' talk about it, act like it doesn't exist, and ooohhh, even better, tell them *not to do it*, they wont!!! that's why there is no teen pregnancy and why young people are not the fastest growing group of people with sexually transmitted infections.....oh!!! hehe i get it now.
okay i wanna give you some more examples of lies and incorrect information in some abstinence-only programs (which, once again, you're totally paying for! and paying OUT THE ASS, once again!)
"None of the curricula prodvides information on how to select a birth control method and use it effectively (in fact, by law, they are not allowed to,rp). However, several curricula exaggerate condom failure rates in preventing pregnancy. Failure rates for contraception are calculated as the probability of a couple experiencing pregnancy when relying primarily on the contraceptive method over the course of a year. 'Typical use' failure rates are often higher than 'perfect use' rates largely because the former include people who use the method incorrectly OR ONLY SOMETIMES. Condoms have a typical use contraceptive failure rate of approximately 15% and a perfect use failure rate of 2 to 3% (WHO). According to the World Health Organization, the difference between typical and perfect use 'is due primarily to inconsistent and incorrect use, not to condom failure. Condom failure-the device breaking or slipping off during intercourse-is uncommon.'"
Okay, now that we all know about condoms, here's what three of the curricula most commonly used say:
"When used by real people in real-life situations, research confirms that 14% of the women who use condoms scrupulously for birth control become pregnant within a year."
okay, using condoms 'scrupulously' means that you use them 'carefully' and 'every time you have sex'. in which case, the 'perfect use' failure rate of 2 to 3% would apply. not 14%. omg.
"Couples who use condoms to avoid a pregnancy have a failure rate of 15%."
"The typical failure rate for the male condom is 14% in preventing pregnancy."
as a scientist, and as a person who cares about what young people are taught, this really really really really really really really really angers me. a lot.
here's something else:
"Another curriculum presents misleading information about the risk of pregnancy from sexual activity other than intercourse. The curriculum erroneously states that touching another person's genitals 'CAN RESULT IN PREGNANCY'." in what world? seriously? this is not even physically possible.
oh my.
here comes some more:
'abstinence-only curricula contain false and misleading information about the risks of abortion.'
I'll just paraphrase. some of these say that the following bad outcomes 'follow' or 'are caused by' voluntary, legal abortion:
sterility
premature birth of later, wanted pregnancies
tubal and cervical pregnancies
anxiety
grief
guilt
depression
suicide
In reality, none of this has ever ever EVER proven to be the case. I'm surprised they didn't pull up that whole "abortion causes breast cancer" bullshit.
okay. in the part of the report about how these programs blur science and religion into one and offer them up to children as undeniable and scientifically proven truth and fact, here is an example of that:
"After contraception, the TINY BABY moves down the fallopian tube toward the mother's uterus. About the sixth to tenth day after conception, when THE BABY is no bigger than this dot (.), BABY SNUGGLES into the soft nest in the lining of the mother's uterus."
I personally do not consider a blastocyte, which is basically a ball of cells, to be the same thing as a TINY BABY and i'm quite sure it is incapable of the physical act of SNUGGLING. quite sure.
The same curriculum tells students: "Ten to twelve weeks after conception: he/she can hear and see." The curriculum cites a source that actually states, "Can the fetus see inside the uterus? We do not know." The source also states that fetuses begin to react to sound between the fourth and fifth months, not at 10 to 12 weeks."
whoa. everyone has his or her own idea about when "life" begins or what "life" even means. i don't personally believe that a ten week old fetus can hear and see. i just don't. they don't even have fully formed ears or eyes. i'm sure that having a wanted pregnancy is a really magical event that hopefully i will one day experience. i don't dislike babies. or fetuses. i like them. i think anyone who knows me will know i'm not a baby hater. by any means. but ten week old fetuses CANNOT see or hear. they just aren't that developed. this is a scientific inaccuracy which is really upsetting.
now, here's the portion where stereotypes about men and women are presented as fact and taught to our children. here's an example:
"Just as a woman needs to feel a man's devotion to her, a man has a primary need to feel a woman's admiration. To admire a man is to regard him with wonder, delight, and approval. A man feels admired when his unique characteristics and talents happily amaze her."
this paints a picture of women staring doe-eyed at their husbands happily clapping and slobbering all over themselves at his ability to do anything, while all he has to do is not cheat on her. i cannot begin to explain how pissed off this makes me. i think people in relationships *both* want to feel devotion and admiration, wonder, delight, and approval. why is this restricted only to men? is this 2005 or 1905? seriously.
here's something else:
"The father gives the bride to the groom because he is the one man who has had the responsibility of protecting her throughout her life. He is now giving his daughter to the only other man who will take over this protective role."
cute! i'm sorry. really. i love my father. i do. but if i ever get married i don't think i can do the whole 'giving away' thing. because a) my father doesn't own me; b) my possible future husband will definitely NOT own me; and c) you can only 'give' something you own to someone else. oh maybe it's just a sweet cute tradition but i can't really buy that. and a lot of women have fathers and husbands who do anything *but* protect them. in fact, they hurt them. so yeah.
haha, okay i actually laughed out loud at the absurdity of this one:
"While a man needs little or no preparation for sex, a woman often needs hours of emotional and mental preparation."
HOURS! hours! and hours! good luck, boys!
and finally, as a psychologist i found this really interesting:
did you know the following:
isolation
jealousy
poverty
heartbreak
substance abuse
unstable long-term commitments
sexual violence
embarrassment
depression
personal disappointment
feelings of being used
loss of honesty
loneliness
suicide
"can be eliminated by being abstinent until marriage".
oh, wow.
eliminated.
here's the conclusion of the report:
"Under the Bush Administration, federal support for abstinence-only education has risen dramatically. This report finds that over two-thirds of abstinence-only education programs funded by the largest federal abstinence initiative are using curricula with multiple scientific and medical inaccuracies. These curricula contain misinformation about condoms, abortion, and basic scientific facts. They also blur religion and science and present gender stereotypes as fact."
this is a really interesting report and you should all get online and read it.
i'm exhausted.
some of you might not know very much about the sorry sad state of sex education in the US today. so let me let you in on a little secret: sex education in the US today is in a sorry sad state.
BUT! you say, i'm from the us, i was educated in public schools and my sex education was superb! well i say fine for you. but just so you know, the disease is a degenerative one (those of you who voted for bush can pat yourselves on the back for this one!).
in bush's proposed budget, abstinence-only sex education programs are set to receive $206 million dollars a year. let me repeat that $206. million. dollars. a. year. a. year. yes, a year.
in FY2005, the federal government will definitely spend about $170 million dollars on these "abstinence-only" programs. i'm reading something real interesting, referred to as "the waxman report" right now, so let me let you in on some of the information in this report (which was prepared for rep. henry waxman by "the united states house of representatives commitee on government reform-minority staff special investigations division"...sounds official, eh?)
be prepared to be pissed.
abstinence-only "education" (and i use that term loosely and with regret) promotes "abstinence from sexual activity without teaching basic facts about contraception".
now, i'm all about teenagers abstaining. i did. and i totally survived those years. but i also knew about condoms and alternative sexualities and abortion and pregnancy and venereal diseases and trusted myself to make the right decisions. and i did. *gasp* but the point is that teenagers don't abstain. most teenagers in the US will have sex by the time they graduate from high school. and an even greater number will have sex sometime in their lives. so they need this information. they need to know about sex.
"Other developed countries focus much more on contraception. The upshot is that while teenagers in the U.S. have about as much sexual activity as teenagers in Canada or Europe, Americans girls are four times as likely as German girls to become pregnant, almost five times as likely as French girls to have a baby, and more than seven times as likely as Dutch girls to have an abortion. Young Americans are five times as likely to have H.I.V. as young Germans, and teenagers' gonorrhea rate is 70 times higher in the U.S. than in the Netherlands or France." from http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/16/opinion/16kristof.html?ex=1109307600&en=29f54ad0bc265467&ei=5070
everyone should go, read that now, and then come back and read this next:
here are some other problems:
"Over 80% of the abstinence-only curricula, used by over two-thirds of [federal government] grantees in 2003 contain false, misleading, or distorted information about reproductive health." (waxman report, p. i)
here are some examples. this is being funded by *your* government, ladies and gentlemen, and is going to be getting even *more* money:
one curriculum says that "in heterosexual sex, condoms fail to prevent HIV approximately 31% of the time". oh really? that's news to me. yeah because it's a lie.
so the result?
(from the NY times link above)
"...there's some evidence that abstinence-only programs lead to increases in unprotected sex.
Perhaps the most careful study of the issue involved 12,000 young people. It found that those taking virginity pledges had sex 18 months later, on average, than those who had not taken the pledge. But even 88 percent of the pledgers had sex before marriage.
More troubling, the pledgers were much less likely to use contraception when they did have sex - only 40 percent of the males used condoms, compared with 59 percent of those who did not take the pledge. "
NICE!
i really love the idea of 60 % of teenagers having sex NOT using condoms!!! but why should they, if they all have giant holes in them?
here's some more false information:
"one curriculum states that 5% to 10% of women who have legal abortions will become sterile" this is simply NOT TRUE!!! there is NO increased risk of sterility following abortion. please, someone show me a scientific study that has this as its result. or, even more, produce for me one single woman who got an abortion and became sterile as a result. what? you can't? oh that's because it's NOT TRUE!!!
"another curriculum calls a 43-day old fetus a 'thinking person'."
i'm not touching this one. but you can have your own ideas about it. it's definitely not the sort of "fact" children should be learning through our federal tax money though.
"Abstinence-only curricula treat stereotypes about girls and boys as scientific fact: {one} instructs: 'Women gauge their happiness and judge their success on their relationships. Men's happiness and success hinge on their accomplishments.'"
this, once again, is FUNDED and FUNDED OUT THE ASS by your government. in other words, I paid for this sort of bullshit to reach children's eyes. so did you. way to go!
"Abstinence-only curricula contain scientific errors: [one] states that 'twenty-four chromosomes from the mother and twenty-four chromosomes from the father join to create this new individual'; the correct number is 23."
yes, if you have forty-eight chromosomes, you are going to be one messed up individual. or dead. i don't know the exact repercussions. but i don't think they're good.
now, abstinence-only "education"...does it work? i mean, yeah, if kids don't have sex until they're adults or 'old enough' (whatever that is...), then, hmmm, that'd be great. and it would justify (maybe) the administration pouring millions and millions more dollars into these programs....so do they work? do they? huh? huh?
"in the most comprehensive analysis of teen pregnancy prevention programs, researchers found that 'the few rigorous studies of abstinence-only curricula that have been completed to date do now show any overall effect on sexual behavior or contraceptive use'."
in other words....NO! they don't work....
"in contrast, comprehensive sex education that both encourages abstinence and teaches about effective contraceptive use has been shown in many studies to delay sex, reduce the frequency of sex, and increase the use of condoms and other contraceptives."
wait a minute......this works? huh? but we're not financing that sort of education...i don't get it......*scratching head* oh that's right!!! we're not supposed to talk about sex with children!!!! ohhhhhhh!!!!! i get it. because if we dont' talk about it, act like it doesn't exist, and ooohhh, even better, tell them *not to do it*, they wont!!! that's why there is no teen pregnancy and why young people are not the fastest growing group of people with sexually transmitted infections.....oh!!! hehe i get it now.
okay i wanna give you some more examples of lies and incorrect information in some abstinence-only programs (which, once again, you're totally paying for! and paying OUT THE ASS, once again!)
"None of the curricula prodvides information on how to select a birth control method and use it effectively (in fact, by law, they are not allowed to,rp). However, several curricula exaggerate condom failure rates in preventing pregnancy. Failure rates for contraception are calculated as the probability of a couple experiencing pregnancy when relying primarily on the contraceptive method over the course of a year. 'Typical use' failure rates are often higher than 'perfect use' rates largely because the former include people who use the method incorrectly OR ONLY SOMETIMES. Condoms have a typical use contraceptive failure rate of approximately 15% and a perfect use failure rate of 2 to 3% (WHO). According to the World Health Organization, the difference between typical and perfect use 'is due primarily to inconsistent and incorrect use, not to condom failure. Condom failure-the device breaking or slipping off during intercourse-is uncommon.'"
Okay, now that we all know about condoms, here's what three of the curricula most commonly used say:
"When used by real people in real-life situations, research confirms that 14% of the women who use condoms scrupulously for birth control become pregnant within a year."
okay, using condoms 'scrupulously' means that you use them 'carefully' and 'every time you have sex'. in which case, the 'perfect use' failure rate of 2 to 3% would apply. not 14%. omg.
"Couples who use condoms to avoid a pregnancy have a failure rate of 15%."
"The typical failure rate for the male condom is 14% in preventing pregnancy."
as a scientist, and as a person who cares about what young people are taught, this really really really really really really really really angers me. a lot.
here's something else:
"Another curriculum presents misleading information about the risk of pregnancy from sexual activity other than intercourse. The curriculum erroneously states that touching another person's genitals 'CAN RESULT IN PREGNANCY'." in what world? seriously? this is not even physically possible.
oh my.
here comes some more:
'abstinence-only curricula contain false and misleading information about the risks of abortion.'
I'll just paraphrase. some of these say that the following bad outcomes 'follow' or 'are caused by' voluntary, legal abortion:
sterility
premature birth of later, wanted pregnancies
tubal and cervical pregnancies
anxiety
grief
guilt
depression
suicide
In reality, none of this has ever ever EVER proven to be the case. I'm surprised they didn't pull up that whole "abortion causes breast cancer" bullshit.
okay. in the part of the report about how these programs blur science and religion into one and offer them up to children as undeniable and scientifically proven truth and fact, here is an example of that:
"After contraception, the TINY BABY moves down the fallopian tube toward the mother's uterus. About the sixth to tenth day after conception, when THE BABY is no bigger than this dot (.), BABY SNUGGLES into the soft nest in the lining of the mother's uterus."
I personally do not consider a blastocyte, which is basically a ball of cells, to be the same thing as a TINY BABY and i'm quite sure it is incapable of the physical act of SNUGGLING. quite sure.
The same curriculum tells students: "Ten to twelve weeks after conception: he/she can hear and see." The curriculum cites a source that actually states, "Can the fetus see inside the uterus? We do not know." The source also states that fetuses begin to react to sound between the fourth and fifth months, not at 10 to 12 weeks."
whoa. everyone has his or her own idea about when "life" begins or what "life" even means. i don't personally believe that a ten week old fetus can hear and see. i just don't. they don't even have fully formed ears or eyes. i'm sure that having a wanted pregnancy is a really magical event that hopefully i will one day experience. i don't dislike babies. or fetuses. i like them. i think anyone who knows me will know i'm not a baby hater. by any means. but ten week old fetuses CANNOT see or hear. they just aren't that developed. this is a scientific inaccuracy which is really upsetting.
now, here's the portion where stereotypes about men and women are presented as fact and taught to our children. here's an example:
"Just as a woman needs to feel a man's devotion to her, a man has a primary need to feel a woman's admiration. To admire a man is to regard him with wonder, delight, and approval. A man feels admired when his unique characteristics and talents happily amaze her."
this paints a picture of women staring doe-eyed at their husbands happily clapping and slobbering all over themselves at his ability to do anything, while all he has to do is not cheat on her. i cannot begin to explain how pissed off this makes me. i think people in relationships *both* want to feel devotion and admiration, wonder, delight, and approval. why is this restricted only to men? is this 2005 or 1905? seriously.
here's something else:
"The father gives the bride to the groom because he is the one man who has had the responsibility of protecting her throughout her life. He is now giving his daughter to the only other man who will take over this protective role."
cute! i'm sorry. really. i love my father. i do. but if i ever get married i don't think i can do the whole 'giving away' thing. because a) my father doesn't own me; b) my possible future husband will definitely NOT own me; and c) you can only 'give' something you own to someone else. oh maybe it's just a sweet cute tradition but i can't really buy that. and a lot of women have fathers and husbands who do anything *but* protect them. in fact, they hurt them. so yeah.
haha, okay i actually laughed out loud at the absurdity of this one:
"While a man needs little or no preparation for sex, a woman often needs hours of emotional and mental preparation."
HOURS! hours! and hours! good luck, boys!
and finally, as a psychologist i found this really interesting:
did you know the following:
isolation
jealousy
poverty
heartbreak
substance abuse
unstable long-term commitments
sexual violence
embarrassment
depression
personal disappointment
feelings of being used
loss of honesty
loneliness
suicide
"can be eliminated by being abstinent until marriage".
oh, wow.
eliminated.
here's the conclusion of the report:
"Under the Bush Administration, federal support for abstinence-only education has risen dramatically. This report finds that over two-thirds of abstinence-only education programs funded by the largest federal abstinence initiative are using curricula with multiple scientific and medical inaccuracies. These curricula contain misinformation about condoms, abortion, and basic scientific facts. They also blur religion and science and present gender stereotypes as fact."
this is a really interesting report and you should all get online and read it.
i'm exhausted.
